Budget 2013 - reaction from business and industry

Reaction from business, lobby groups, politicians and the rest to chancellor George Osborne's budget 2013

Updated

Britain's chancellor George Osborne holding the traditional red dispatch box poses for the media with the Treasury team outside his official residence at No 11 Downing Street in London this morning. Photograph: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP

Childcare and welfare

Gingerbread, a charity that offers advice and support to single parents, says the pre-budget announcement on increased childcare help does not begin to mitigate the devastating cuts to the welfare safety net.

The charity's chief executive, Fiona Weir, said:

While we welcome the government’s investment in childcare, 2015 feels like a very long time to wait for low income single parent families, who may not have a car, a five per cent house deposit or a fondness for beer, but who are struggling to pay their bills and put food on the table today.

Despite very little being said on welfare in today’s budget, within two weeks the devastating welfare cuts announced by the chancellor in December will begin to bite. These are cuts that will push more children into poverty.

Added to these cuts, the hancellor’s oblique reference today to capping areas of welfare spending is deeply concerning. This threatens further pain for families who have already borne the brunt of welfare cuts. We will be looking to the spending review for measures to support, not punish, those on low incomes.

WWF

Environmental charity WWF-UK agrees the budget was a death knell for clean, green technologies:

This chancellor's budget was remarkable in two respects; first in its overlooking one of the strongest-growing sector of the economy, namely the green economy; and secondly, in its determination to extend yet more tax breaks to the fossil fuel sector.

With the annual growth rate for the green economy standing at around five per cent, it's simply amazing the chancellor shouldn't be more vocal in supporting it.

The prime minister himself has said that the countries that will win the global race in the future economy are the ones that will embrace new, clean green technologies like renewables and energy efficiency.

Handing yet more subsidies to nuclear and tax breaks to fossil fuels - the technologies of yesterday - whilst ignoring the technologies of tomorrow is not the way to do this. The Chancellor seems to be fixated on backing the wrong horses.

Energy investment

Nathan Goode, partner and head of energy, environment and sustainability at Grant Thornton UK LLP, said:

The budget statement confirms that the current focus of this government's energy investment strategy is perpetuating the use of fossil fuels rather than investing further in alternatives, with measures to support shale gas exploration and the development of two carbon capture and storage projects.

It also reinforces a determination to proceed with new nuclear, and with the chancellor's reiteration of the Hinckley Point planning consent announced yesterday, it seems to be a matter of when, not if, the strike price will be agreed with EDF Energy.

These may be appropriate decisions in a mixed energy strategy, but the absence of any reference to renewables in the chancellor's speech will be interpreted as a deprioritisation of this sector. Many will also question the appropriateness of subsidising non-standard fossil fuel exploration, alongside the cancellation of the fuel duty allowance.

Renewable energy was overlooked in favour of a rush for shale gas in George Osborne's budget.

Pension funds

The National Association of Pension Funds is happy Osborne has brought forward the introduction of the new flat-rate state pension, with the slight caveat that company pension schemes should be protected from any knock-on effects.

Joanne Segars, chief executive of the NAPF, said:

We strongly welcome proposals for a new, single tier state pension. But the government has to ensure that the changes are implemented in a way that does not damage company pension schemes. This is a very tight timeframe and we question whether it can be delivered. Schemes need flexibility and time to adapt.

If the government gets it wrong then it risks sparking a fresh round of final salary pension closures in the private sector. Businesses that get caught on the wrong side of these changes will lose a significant rebate from the end of contracting out, and this extra cost may prompt them to close their pensions altogether.

We have waited many years for these reforms. An overhaul of the state pension is long overdue and a simpler, fairer system helps set a clear foundation on which people can build their own savings. It would be a shame if mistakes were made in a rush to implement the changes.

North of England

No such kind words from thinktanks based north of the Watford Gap. Osborne's measures will do more to further inflate house prices and childcare costs in London and very little to boost regional development, says Ed Cox, director of IPPR North. He said:

George Osborne has missed an opportunity today to enable the North to play its part in leading us out of our economic stagnation. In the light of the positive response of the government to the Heseltine report on Monday, we would have liked to have seen a greater shift of emphasis today towards rebalancing the economy of the UK, with a greater degree of urgency. Today the Chancellor could have freed up our economy to enable the North to play a more significant role in driving growth

Manchester: not a beneficiary of Gideon's kindness, according to IPPR North.

Federation of Small Businesses

The Federation of Small Businesses could hardly be more effusive about today's budget, saying the chancellor's measures went beyond even what they had hoped for

John Walker, the FSB's national chairman, said:

The FSB asked for a budget for small businesses and this is what has been delivered. This Budget opens the door for small firms to grow and create jobs. The Chancellor has pulled out all the stops with a wide-ranging package of measures to support small firms. FSB says the housing initiative will help reinvigorate the construction sector in which many of our members operate and where confidence has been low.

The National Insurance Contributions (NICs) cut goes beyond what we were asking for and we are pleased to see the 3p fuel duty rise due in September completely scrapped. We now look forward to hearing details on how the Government intends to take forward the Business Bank that will help provide much needed access to capital for small firms.

Air passenger duty

Airlines will be disappointed there was no reduction in the tax paid on air travel – currently £13 per short-haul flight from the UK.

Daniel Barlow, an indirect tax partner in the travel, hospitality and travel practice at Deloitte, said the levy "does not help the UK's competitiveness":

The government is committed to retaining Air Passenger Duty (APD), probably for the simple reason that it raises £3 billion of revenue per year and only costs 0.06 pence to collect for every £1 raised. However, the debate on APD is more complex. The aviation industry has put forward arguments that the tax does not help the UK’s competitiveness, given that the majority of EU Member States do not have a similar tax.

Furthermore, there are areas where APD causes distortions of competition and requires reform. For example, a passenger flying from Belfast to Alicante will pay £13 APD if they fly direct. However, they are likely to pay £26 APD if they make the same journey but book two connecting flights through London with budget airlines. The same passenger will pay €3 Irish Air Travel Tax APD if they go over the border and catch their flight to Alicante from Dublin. If the government is set on retaining APD, it’s likely that the industry will focus on ending these types of market distortion.

Federation of Master Builders

The FMB worries that the measures announced today may not go far enough to allow smaller builders to deliver the energy-efficent new homes Britain needs.

Brian Berry, the FMB's chief executive, said:

We needed a ‘Budget for Housing’ to address the acute shortage of affordable, energy-efficient homes in the UK. The Help to Buy package is aimed at stimulating the underperfroming mortgage market, which could provide a boost to all firms involved in house building, renovation and repair. But changes to the FirstBuy scheme will be of limited assistance if it remains too costly and complex for smaller developers, who deliver a third of all new homes.

Britain’s SME builders are in need of relief after years of shrinking workloads and rising costs. More than three-quarters of our members recently told us that the most important thing the Government could do to revitalise the home repair, maintenance and energy-efficiency markets would be to cut VAT. This would also provide a level playing field when competing with builders who choose to avoid charging VAT.”

War on Want

The anti-poverty charity War on Want calls the chancellor's deal with Crown Dependencies "promising", but warns that is does not go far enough to clamp down on routine tax avoidance, calling it "a hollow PR stunt".

Tax justice campaigner Murray Worthy said:

Osborne’s announcement of a new ‘anti-abuse rule’ at the heart of his supposed tax avoidance clampdown is nothing more than a hollow PR stunt. An administrative exercise for HMRC, tinkering around the edges of what is legal, is being dressed up as an assault on tax dodgers. Not only will these plans have no impact on giant corporate tax dodgers, they actually stand to make things worse.

By the government’s own figures this new measure will only bring in tens of millions in lost revenue every year - a drop in the ocean, compared to the billions that could be recovered if this government was actually intent on tackling tax avoidance.

Osborne’s decision to let big companies shirk their responsibilities to society, while forcing through more spending cuts, is morally indefensible.

It is promising that the UK government has finally admitted that the UK’s Crown Dependencies, the Isle of Man and the Channels Islands, are harbouring over a billion pounds of evaded and avoided tax. But the announcement of today’s deal with the government will do nothing to help the world’s poorest people.

Rather than just ensuring the UK government gets its share of the money these islands hide offshore, the government should be taking urgent action to close down all the UK’s tax havens around the world, to stop the flow of billions of pounds out of developing countries every year.

EEF

The manufacturers' organisation welcomed the easing of the tax burden on businesses, but said the budget feels like "a job half done" with regard to the extent of growth spending.

Terry Scuoler, EEF's chief executive, said:

Today’s statement contained some helpful measures on business taxation and some signs of re-prioritising spending for growth but it still feels like a job half done. The chancellor had over £11bn of under-spending in his arsenal and should have done more to drive growth now, particularly through accelerating investment in infrastructure.With forecasts for business investment scaled back heavily for the next five years, the growth and investment challenge we face continues to mount. Looking to the spending review, with the chancellor sticking to his fiscal plans, this can’t just be about tighter spending controls. It must also be about a more radical of shift of spending towards growth.

Green party

A robust takedown of Osborne's sums from the Green party leader Natalie Bennett, who says the chancellor is "a man who's in a hole yet he compulsively can't stop digging".

The Greens dismiss Osborne's raising of the income tax threshold as "superficial". Bennett says:

His slightly amended Plan A for austerity - with some small, and largely unwise, investments in trying to promote largely unaffordable private housing, fracking and road building - is effectively business as usual - an approach that has delivered us youth unemployment of 21.2%, plummeting real wages, and misery for benefit recipients.

What he should have done today is to announce a serious programme of investment in the successful green economy, introduced steps to force banks to lend to small and medium-sized businesses and not further advantaged large corporations by further dropping the corporate tax rate. He should have lifted caps on council borrowing for house building and provided direct capital spending to allow councils to build a mass programme of sustainable council housing.

We also should stop the tax relief on private pension plans and plough that £13 billion a year into the basic state pension – setting that at a level that immediate ensures no pensioner is living in poverty - and reverse the real-terms cuts to benefits contained in the sadly misnamed 'Benefits Uprating Bill'.

The move to raise the income tax threshold to £10,000 by 2014 is one of those policies that sounds superficially attractive and progressive, but as research by the Resolution Foundation has shown, it is actually the wealthiest half of households that stand to most benefit from it. People in the richest 10% of households benefit by £87 a year. The poorest 10% of households gain on average £6 a year.

Diageo

The world's largest producer of spirits, Diageo, is perhaps understandably aggrieved that beer was the only alcohol duty to get a cut:

This move is disappointing. Cutting duty on beer while increasing it on spirits punishes the UK spirits industry for its success in this harsh economic climate. Scotch is the UK’s biggest food and drink export. This move risks that success.'

The Taxpayers' Alliance welcomes the cut in beer duty; the freeze in fuel duty; the increase in the Personal Tax Allowance; the cut in Employers' National Insurance; and the cut in corproation tax.

But it says the government has failed to simplify the tax system. Matthew Sinclair, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said:

George Osborne has announced welcome relief for people struggling with the high cost of living. The cut in beer tax, the freeze in fuel duty and the higher personal allowance will all ease the pressure on family budgets. Lower Employers’ National Insurance and Corporation Tax will also be passed on to workers in higher wages.

Unfortunately, the great limitation of this budget was that it relied far too much on complicated targeted reliefs instead of tax cuts across the board. Simpler, strategic tax reforms that reduce the overall burden would be fairer and do more to produce the stronger economy Britain needs.

We are very disappointed that the government’s tax on flying, already the highest in the world, will increase yet again this year and next. These rises in Air Passenger Duty show the emptiness of rhetoric on boosting exports to emerging economies and building the most competitive tax system in the world.

Increasing this alarmingly uncompetitive tax on business, trade, and inbound tourism beggars belief when the evidence clearly suggests that abolition would deliver growth, create 60,000 jobs and pay for itself through higher receipts from other taxes.

Here's the British Chambers of Commerce, which is largely upbeat in its appraisal of the budget.

John Longworth, director general of the BCC, said:

While there is much for business to welcome in the chancellor's statement, such as reviewing the MPC’s remit, scrapping the rise on fuel duty, and putting £3.5bn into helping buyers afford new homes, he and his cabinet colleagues should have gone further to support enterprise and growth, such as scrapping damaging increases in business rates.

We are at an unprecedented moment in economic history, and the government should be doing everything in its power to get the economy moving. Many of the chancellor’s measures were targeted at larger corporates, and those that will benefit smaller companies will not take effect until 2015, which is too late. We need urgency, scale and delivery today.

If Britain is in a global race, as the Chancellor said in his speech, our political elite needs to act accordingly, and pull out all the stops to support enterprise, jobs, wealth creation and exports. Business will appreciate many of the Chancellor's measures, and his personal commitment to fiscal discipline and support for enterprise, but will wish he had been more radical in the pursuit of growth.

Proponents of low-carbon technologies were disappointed with the budget. Andrew Raingold, executive director of the Aldersgate Group, (which is "an alliance of leaders from business, politics and society that drive action for a sustainable economy"), said:

The chancellor has prioritised increasing exports to the fast growing regions of the world but there is little support in the budget for green industries that have a strong foothold in these markets and a trade surplus of £5bn. Rather than tax breaks for shale gas, the UK needs a clear regulatory framework that will drive investment and export opportunities for low carbon technologies.

The Institute of Directors sounds a similarly positive note. Simon Walker, director general of the IoD said:

We applaud this budget. The chancellor has stuck to his guns and held his nerve - which is exactly what we wanted to see. Deficit reduction is not an optional policy, it is an absolute necessity, and he is right to reject the siren calls to abandon it.

Businesses will be glad that George Osborne has also continued the downward pressure on corporation tax. Britain must become the most competitive place to do business, and lower taxes will attract welcome investment from abroad.

The new allowance to reduce the tax on employing people is a welcome boost for businesses who are working hard to grow. The private sector has done a huge amount to improve the employment figures, and it is right that they are rewarded for doing so. This will see more people helped out of unemployment, which is a very good thing.

We have long called for a coordinated set of policies to encourage the development of a UK shale gas industry. The Chancellor is absolutely right to set attractive conditions for shale exploration - this will create thousands of jobs, and reduce our reliance on expensive foreign imports.

The FSB says the budget opens the door for small businesses to grow and create jobs. The chancellor has pulled out all the stops with a wide ranging package of measures to support small business. The FSB says the housing initiative will help reinvigorate the construction sector in which many of our members operate. The national insurance cut goes beyond what we were asking for and we are pleased to see the scrapping of the 3p fuel duty due in September.

This is a momentous day for Britain's beer drinkers, who will tonight be raising a glass to the Chancellor for axing this damaging tax escalator and helping keep pub-going affordable for hard-pressed consumers. This decision will keep the lid on the cost of a pint down the pub.

Since the duty escalator was introduced in 2008, 5800 pubs have been forced to call last orders for good. What could have been the final nail in the coffin for our pubs has been decisively avoided by the Chancellor in a move that will spark celebration in pubs across the UK.

Scrapping the beer duty escalator, combined with a 1p cut, is a massive vote of confidence in British pubs and will lead to an increase in pub going and more money in the Chancellor’s coffers.

The environmentalists are, however, up in arms over the annoucnement that the planned 3p fuel duty rise has been scrapped. Friends of the Earth economics campaigner David Powell said:

The Chancellor’s refusal to raise fuel duty in line with inflation has deprived treasury coffers of £5bn in the last two years, leaving other parts of the economy to pay the price.

The driving force behind rising petrol prices is the soaring cost of oil – the sensible long-term plan is to protect motorists from rising fuel prices by weaning our transport system off its oil dependency.

The National Housing Federation meanwhile notes the danger of another housing bubble emerging from the measures the chancellor has presented.

National Housing Federation chief executive David Orr said:

We welcome the Chancellor’s realisation that people around the country are struggling to buy their own homes, and the measures introduced today may help a number of them. But the danger is that if we don’t tackle the fact we’re still not building enough homes, we’ll just create another housing bubble that will continue to push house prices up and out of reach of the majority.

Our housing market has long been weakened by the lack of new houses being built, which are forcing up rental and house prices – leaving millions of people struggling to get on the property ladder or pay their rent. The Government should be focusing on unlocking investment to build more new homes as a way of managing down the housing benefit bill and boosting the economy. We welcome the measures to support new supply but they are very small scale.

And we still need the Government to help unlock land banks, free the small publicly owned derelict sites so we can build houses on them and give housing providers long-term certainty over how much income they can expect so they can start planning and building beyond 2015. With the impact of welfare reform still to be fully felt, we need reassurance and long-term commitment so we can play our part in raising the finance needed to build more homes.

More on housing. The Home Builders Federation welcomes the government moves to help new homebuyers but sounds a note of caution.

Stewart Baseley, executive chairman of HBF said:

A lack of affordable mortgage availability remains the biggest constraint on housing supply, something government now clearly understands and is looking to address. Extending NewBuy to the second hand market should create churn in the market place and drive up sales across the board – including for new homes.

We do though need to ensure a level playing field across the whole market. Extending FirstBuy is very welcome and will provide a real option for people currently unable to buy – so providing a vital market for the new homes industry. Building the homes the country desperately needs can be a key driver of economic activity. Government must be praised for its attempts to stimulate activity, but must also be wary to get the details right.

Back to the accountants, and Ernst & Young, which celebrates the chancellor's sleight of hand.

Chris Sanger, Ernst & Young’s global head of tax policy, said:

In a very combative budget speech in the House of Commons, with the shadow chancellor being admonished for not listening quietly, George Osborne started his speech by saying he was going to focus on those people saving for retirement and running a business. With so little to play with, the Red Book listed 24 measures that had been previously announced and added a further 41.

The chancellor’s “rabbit out of the hat” was the new £2,000 Employment Allowance which, costing £ 1.75bn per annum by the end of the forecast period, obscured the other pro-business cut in corporate tax rate to 20% and even the achievement of the £10,000 personal tax allowance for 2014.

With almost £6bn being raised from tackling avoidance and collecting tax debts, the overall cost of the policy decisions is broadly neutral for the fiscal finances. Given the constraints on the economy, the Chancellor may well feel that that was a magical performance.

The Association of Convenience Stores, on the other hand, berates the chancellor for failing to act business rates.

ACS Chief Executive James Lowman said:

The budget does not include any radical changes that will transform confidence amongst everyday entrepreneurs, like local shop owners. The chancellor has failed to act on business rates and missed an opportunity to undertake the radical reform needed to encourage investment in high streets up and down the country.

But it is delighted by moves to reduce the cost of national insurance, duty rates on beer and introduce faster payments for card transactions,

We welcome the Employment Allowance which will help local shops to take on more employees.

We are delighted that thousands of our members will have the opportunity to benefit from Faster Payment Services. For small supermarkets and petrol forecourt stores, this will make a significant difference to cash flow, keeping more stores open and able to invest in their business and their community. We are working with the Treasury to ensure that this service is made available swiftly and at low cost to retailers.

We welcome the decision to freeze beer duty, this will benefit consumers and reduce some of the pressure on local shops losing trade to the illegal market. It’s a shame this benefit will not be shared by customers buying wine, spirits and cider.

The chancellor also managed to get housebuilders on side. The British Property Federation welcomed the government's funding increase to kick start build-to-rent schemes.

Ian Fletcher, director of policy at the British Property Federation, said:

It's encouraging the Government’s confidence in build to rent has been reciprocated and we are delighted to see that the equity funding was heavily oversubscribed. Working in partnership with Government the sector should deliver an exciting and quality array of homes for renters.

Here's Michael Wistow, head of tax at City law firm Berwin Leighton Paisner, on the changes to the corporation tax regime:

It can only be good news to reduce corporation tax rates from 2015 to 20 per cent and to abolish transfer taxes on AIM shares and to have an emphasis on reduced tax rates which result in the rich paying a higher proportion of total taxes raised than the populist concentration on rates of tax.

The abolition of schedule 19 is an example of how the government can use the tax regime to the benefit of investors. Schedule 19 was a complex and confusing area of taxation and its abolition will have a small and welcome benefit on the domestic funds industry.

On the bank levy increase versus the corporation tax cut: "It sounds like the bank levy increases two years before the corporation tax cut in 2015 that it is meant to match.

On the possible extensions to the Funding for Lending scheme, Mark Blackwell, managing director of xit2, property data specialists, said:

Funding for Lending isn’t really sustaining first time buyer activity, and has been poorly targeted. Lower monthly payments for the better-off – those with the most equity – will do little to lift a sluggish housing market.

Given the Government’s pledge to support borrowers, today’s 8% fall in gross mortgage lending will be a significant disappointment. A one percent uplift in gross mortgage lending from a year ago is a very poor performance given the external impetus lenders are able to access. Including non-banks in Funding for Lending could make the scheme more effective.

However, lenders can be applauded for some of their caution – a return to the recklessness of 2007 would be as much of a failure as a further collapse in lending levels. Quality of lending is as important as quantity. Proper property and credit risk management will be vital for a more sustainable model of lending in future.

ActionAid adds its voice to the crowds welcoming the announcement on international aid.

The NGO's UK head of advocacy, Melanie Ward, said:

Today’s budget announcement on aid will save lives and make history. Tonight 1 in 8 people across the world will go to bed hungry. It is not the British way to walk by on the other side when others are in need, and we can all be proud of keeping our nation’s promise not to forget the very poorest in the world, even as we struggle ourselves.

UK aid is making an enormous difference across the world – a difference that we at ActionAid see for ourselves every day. The Government and Opposition deserve credit for their consensus that keeping our 43 year old promise on aid is the right thing to do.

Just as UK aid saves lives, poor countries are increasing the money they raise domestically through tax. But the same accountancy tricks that cost the UK billions are being used by British firms operating in the developing world. After much tough talk from the Chancellor, the tax avoidance measures announced today are nothing more than tinkering at the edges. They are not designed to tackle the vast majority of tax avoidance techniques by multinationals, either in the UK or abroad.

As the current chair of the G8, the UK has committed to stopping widespread international tax avoidance. Yet the Chancellor has shown little appetite to start the crack-down at home, despite polling showing that around three quarters of the public think it should, echoing recommendations from the UN, IMF and OECD. To be taken seriously on the global stage in June, the Chancellor should use the Finance Bill to ensure UK multinationals have to disclose any tax avoidance around the world – helping both the UK and the poorest countries to raise the revenues needed to fight poverty and end hunger. We will be working with the IF campaign to increase the pressure on him to do so.

UNICEF meanwhile welcomes the promise that Britain will stick to spending 0.7% of gross national income (GNI) on international aid.

David Bull, UNICEF UK’s executive director, said:

Today is a historic day for the world’s poorest children and a proud day for Britain. Keeping our promises to the world’s poorest children and their families is both the right thing to do and is in Britain’s interests.

Already aid has saved millions of children’s lives around the world and for that we should all hold our heads up high. Right now, British aid is helping UNICEF to deliver nutrition, safe drinking water, essential vaccines, education, clothing and protection to millions of children affected by the crisis in Syria. By providing this much needed support, UNICEF, with the help of British aid, is helping to ensure Syria’s children do not become a lost generation. This is a clear example of British aid working hard for those that need it most.

0.7% is a tiny amount of our GNI but as we are seeing in Syria it can have a colossal impact on ordinary children’s lives.

Chris Sanger, Ernst & Young’s global head of tax policy, comments on the reduction of the corporation tax rate:

By confirming that the UK corporate tax rate will drop to 20%, the Chancellor has delivered the ambition he set out in the last Budget. The UK’s tax regime is already attracting more jobs and investment to our shores, and this latest step reinforces the message that Britain is open for business.

“Combined with confirmation of the GAAR, and the UK’s commitment to participating in the OECD’s project on international taxation, the Chancellor is making it clear that the UK is a competitive place to do business but that he expects all parties pay their fair share.

“Clients have been telling us that the UK’s tax regime is an asset, but 67% of the tax professionals we surveyed prior to the Budget said that uncertainty created by the fair tax debate is a deterrent to increasing the level of their activities here. The Chancellor’s Budget speech today will hopefully have helped to address some of these concerns.

Unless an offshore employer has a place of business in the UK or is required to account for tax or National Insurance contributions (NIC) under a treaty, it won't usually be liable for UK tax or NIC in respect of amounts paid to its employees.

The government is concerned by the impact on the benefit entitlements of individuals working in the UK but employed by offshore companies, as well as the potential loss of tax and NIC, estimated at c.£100m a year.

As well as teachers and nurses, oil and gas workers are also under the spotlight but the rules relating to workers on the UK continental shelf are more complex. It has long been accepted by HMRC that no liability arises in many of those cases.

We’ll have to wait for the detail to be announced in a consultation document in May. It seems likely that the Government will want to consider ways to give the existing rules a bigger bite. Currently, those businesses in the UK engaging workers (the “end users”) supplied by offshore employment companies can be liable for UK tax and NIC, but only in certain circumstances.

Widening the scope and impact of those rules to make UK end users more clearly liable would be one possibility. However, any new legislation should not impact workers employed and working overseas. Although oil and gas workers were specifically mentioned, the treatment of workers in the North Sea is more complex and remains unclear.

Hello and welcome to our live blog tracking all the reaction to today's budget. Check out the politics live blog, run by Andrew Sparrow and Graeme Wearden, for detail of what's in the budget, as it emerges.

Chancellor George Osborne has been careful to manage expectations, but he'll be sure to rile some, disappoint others and, who knows, some groups may be happy with today's measures.